What is the universal tag that identifies the artist's aliases so you can have a better search result for a well documented library of songs.

For Example:

Twista was known as "Tung Twista" in his early releases as a rap artist, but for every release I want to add an alias so I can remember that it is the same artist and I don't have to make more folders when I can put his discography in one folder labeled as "Twista".

Did you consider using the artist sortname and album artist sortname field for this? You could use the most common name in the sortname field and organize your files by this name. Still, your artist field could contain a different name. This of course only works if you're not planning to add more than one alias for every release/track by this artist. Most software players should support this by now. It's a different thing with hardware players, of course.

I've got The Miracles, Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, and Smokey Robinson. I might have the same exact recording released on 3 different albums with 3 different artist names.

The song Gloria was originally released by a band called Them (Van Morrison was the lead singer), and now it's considered a Van Morrison song, and the same original recording has been re-released on Van Morrison Greatest hits compilations.

And, didn't J-Lo used to be Jennifer Lopez? Or, is she still Jennifer Lopez?

There is no proper solution to this problem, only kludges. The audio tag system is akin to a flat database. You can't have relationships between tags. So soulsearchingsun's suggestion, though flawed, is probably (and sadly) the best way to deal with aliases.

I did it the same way by creating a custom field (which I named LP ARTIST, but the name itself doesn't matter) filled with the exact name on the record cover while I fill the ARTIST field with the most known name.

So I may have these LP ARTIST:

* Johnny Cougar* John Cougar* John Cougar Mellencamp* John Mellencamp

All of them will be "John Mellencamp" in the ARTIST tag.

DVDdoug: same method applied to your example:

LP ARTIST:

* The Miracles* Smokey Robinson and The Miracles* Smokey Robinson

ARTIST (multivalued, 2 tags for each track):

* Smokey Robinson* The Miracles

I use exclusively Foobar2000 and has been doing so for years, so custom tags are not a problem for me. But using ARTIST SORTNAME is a better idea since much more players will read that tag.

I use exclusively Foobar2000 and has been doing so for years, so custom tags are not a problem for me. But using ARTIST SORTNAME is a better idea since much more players will read that tag.

I have been using Foobar2000 for about a year now and my god is it such a light-weight, but at the same time powerful beast of an audio player. I do use custom tags as I started to notice that it was possible through this program and I have set up my template using "MP3Tag" so every release I own I have them similarly tagged.

So what your saying is name the artist by his/her current name and add a tag with it's alias at the time for a certain release? So that tag would be "ARTIST SORTNAME" what exactly does that read in most players? Is that where I put the artist alias name during the release at a specific time?

Aphex Twin is an even worse case. He's used a dozen names, many for only one release. Aphex Twin, AFX, Bradley Strider, GAK, Power-Pill, Caustic Window, ...

What I did for him is just put the pseudonym he used in the regular ARTIST field, plus "aphex twin" in the COMMENT tag. foobar2000's search feature then lists all his releases when I do a search for "aphex twin". Now, I believe that foobar searches all tag fields. So, creating a custom field, maybe called ALIAS or SEARCH, would also probably work, if you are hesitant to use the COMMENT field.

(I'm now realizing this is pretty much exactly what BoraBora said.)

Unfortunately, I don't think there's any proper, standardized way to do this. And software other than foobar may not search custom tag fields. Closest thing to a standard that you could use to specify more than one artist name for a song would probably be ALBUM ARTIST. It's normally used for compilations with multiple artists on one album, but you could also bend it to be used for multiple names of a single artist. Foobar has good built-in support for sorting by ALBUM ARTIST, and I believe several other players do too. ARTIST SORTNAME may be worth checking out, but personally this is the first time I've ever heard of it, and couldn't tell you more.

So what your saying is name the artist by his/her current name and add a tag with it's alias at the time for a certain release? So that tag would be "ARTIST SORTNAME" what exactly does that read in most players? Is that where I put the artist alias name during the release at a specific time?

In most players, I don't know, since I'm Foobar-centric, which is why I don't care using a custom tag. But yes, the point is sorting on a tag (the most known artist name) and display another tag (the artist name used for each specific release).

I tag the collaborations the same way. "B.B. King feat. Mavis Staples" will be my custom tag, used for display, while the ARTIST tags will be "B.B. King" and "Mavis Staples" (multivalued) for sorting. Doing so allow me to keep the relationship ("&", "with", "feat" etc.) without having different artist tags with the exact same artists.

I even use it for some bands, when the name is simply a collaboration while omitting the names or surnames (sorry if that's not clear, I wish I could express myself better in english). Like "Otis & Carla" (Otis Redding & Carla Thomas), "Simon & Garfunkel", "Young-Stills", "Crosby & Nash" etc.

I use foobar2000 with Columns UI (alternative user interface) and its built in Playlist Viewer (NG Playlist).Everything I do in foobar2000 is based on using ONLY standard tags and title-formatting trickery.Personally, I have no interest in managing the properties of an artist with multiple names ...I just pick one name and accept it.

If I had an interest in managing this, I would use fb2k title-formatting syntax trickery like this example:------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<example>

So, I chose to extract one of the alias names amongst an array of alias names for this artist by using a delimiting method;the script flags the triple-parenthesis characters ((( and ))) in the Artist tag and performs a string extraction operation.

If I conduct a 'Library Search' or 'Playlist Search' using this query: %album artist% HAS "aphex twin"then all the other aliases will be included in the search.

*************************** !!! IMPORTANT NOTE !!! ***************************This is a highly customized way of formatting objects. If this scheme is used, then you MUST also configure custom display scripts for the other parts of your foobar2000 layout, such as the Main Window Title Bar, and the Notification Area Pop-Up Info, and the Playlist Search window, and the Library Search window, etc, etc.To be honest, this way of displaying ones music collection is not for half-hearted users, or for users wanting to interface automatically with other services or programs on the internet.

I may be misunderstanding your process, but it seems to me you have to fill the ARTIST tag with all the aliases for each album/track? So each time you import an album/track with a new alias in the library, you have to change every previous releases by this artist to add this new alias?

My methods of working with my music collection have no regard for time limits or automation or 'one-click solutions' or interfacing with anybody elses pseudo-standards or worrying about the mind-set of an artist who chooses to change his name every time he creates a new album; that's his problem not mine.

As I stated before "I have no interest in managing the properties of an artist with multiple names ...I just pick one name and accept it."

If I was implementing my previous example, depending on my mood and/or if I like the artist enough to care, I will update his alias array in the Artist tag, manually and in my spare time ...and I will do it like this:

To make things a bit more complicated, a few of the changes from ID3v2.3 to ID3v2.4 concern frame names that could have been used.

The 4.2.5 TSOP Performer sort order, is new. No go in ID3v2.3. Otherwise, this would be a suitable place for all Richard D. James aliases.

The IPLS - Involved people list is replaced by 4.2.2 TIPL Involved people list AND 4.2.2 TMCL Musician credits list.Then of course one could use TPE3, the 'performer refinement'. But e.g. foobar2000 only puts CONDUCTOR there.

Alright I have made my mind. I have decided to go with the 'MusicBrainz' way by doing so:

"Album Artist"=Movado (this was the name-variant that it was released under)%ALBUMARTISTSORT%=Mavado (this is the artist's current name)

Reason why I don't want to just pick one name is because I have an OCD with my music library for archive purposes. My music library was literally nothing 2 years ago. Now I am so heavily into this that starting off collecting the right way I shouldn't have problems in the future. It's all about the rich background

I'm having such dilemma as well when dealing with aliases/variant names, and had taken the following approach by using three types of TAG field: ARTIST, ALIAS, AND ARTIST SORTNAME. The ARTIST field is always the artist's real name and the ARTIST SORTNAME is the alias that is used with the track release (or credited with in the booklet).

if artist has no alias>ignore ARTIST SORTNAME and ALIAS

else if artist has only 1 alias>set ARTIST SORTNAME to the alias>ignore ALIAS

else if artist has more than 1 alias>set ALIAS with all the alias he/she is associated with>set ARTIST SORTNAME with the alias that is used with the track